LORD OXFORD WAS SHAKESPEARE

see As Ton Like It " We have the man Shakespeare
with us/' She wanted to cajole the King on
Raleigh's behalf—he came. Slater suggests that
"the man Shakespeare" was Oxford, a welcome
guest at Wilton. He was a friend of Raleigh and
likely to intercede successfully on his behalf.

4 (i)
CHRONOLOGY
In the absence of any original manuscripts,
chronology becomes largely a matter of conjec-
ture, dependent on dates of registration or
publication, and historical or meteorological
incidents, which are often misleading guides. All
we can say is that certain works existed on certain
dates, though they may have existed five or ten
years previously. But in order to identify them
with Edward de Vere as the author, all the works
composed by Shakespeare must have been begun
before June 24, 1604, ^e date of the Earl's death.
This condition is established in the case of the
poems Venus and Lucrece^ and the Sonnets. The
plays remain.
Mrs* Eva Turner Clark, in her book Shake-
speare* s Plays in the Order of their Writing, contends
that the plays were written by Edward de Vere
between 1576 and 1590; that in 1590 the " Paul's
Boys5*—with whom the "Oxford Boys'* were
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